that to many history has seemed aimless. Men have looked upon it as a turbulent sea, whose tossing waves lash and beat at random. They have likened it to a mysterious urn, from whose caverns opposing fates are drawn with equal chance. Regarding history thus, men have talked of its "aimless operations," until the expression has become the shibboleth of pessimism.

1. What explains this lack of discernment? The answer is that men have failed to relate their facts to a great principle. The pessimist has allowed himself to be limited by time. He measures progress by heart-beats rather than by cycles. He thinks of the rotation of this small planet upon its axis, rather than of the millennial movements of solar systems. His method would be to hurry "an Elijah on into a John the Baptist, a Moses into a Paul." But in the divine method there is no haste. Fifteen centuries separate the gospel of Sinai and Calvary; while the visions of the Apocalypse stretch forward into a boundless future. The arm that shattered serfdom moved with gathering force through eighteen hundred years. Men are precipitate; but "Providence hurries not himself to display to-day the consequence of the principles he yesterday announced."

If we look at the past not as a mass of unrelated fragments, but rather as one magnificent whole, we shall find in its succeeding periods the promise of an exalted destiny, toward which the world slowly makes its way. In the midst of the

conflicting forces of evolution and degeneration, can aught but the existence of a purpose explain the preservation of mankind? Tribes and nations died, but the race sweeps steadily onward. Over the relics of primitive man other people build stately homes; Alexander's legions sleep beneath the tread of mightier armies; on every sepulcher of history are strewn the ashes of later camp-fires. So also does the perseverance of truth convince us of a plan in history. Conquering Vandals have swept empires to destruction; embittered subjects have kindled the flames of revolution; inspired Galileos have driven philosophers into oblivion; yet from the violence of conflict, from the throes of dissolution, from the crumblings of perishing institutions, an unseen power has called forth the true principles of better civilizations; and has moulded them into scepters and builded them into thrones. Egyptian immensity was lost in the desert; the gospel of power ended its mission by the Tiber; the apostle of beauty ceased to be praised on the Acropolis; but no pyramid, no obelisk stands a monument to buried truth. Its unbroken cord makes all the ages one.

2. Grandly does analogy bear witness to the truth of this conception of progress. Geology gives its testimony. Go back in imagination and stand on the primordial beach of the earth and behold the operations of nature. What mighty convulsions! There, a stratum almost

perfect is upheaved and the monstrous waves beat it to fragments. Yonder, whole species of animals, apparently working out their proper destiny, are suddenly exterminated. What does it all mean? What plan can there be in destruction alternating with formation? Surely the operations of nature are aimless! But look! The horizon has receded. We stand on the summit of geologic time and hear the verdict of the present from the lips of Dana and Miller. Where we saw extermination, they point out creation; where we marveled at aimlessness, they reveal an increasing purpose. "See," they say, "the crashings and upheaval of nature have merely made possible the evolution of a grander plan, obscured to the narrow view of a human life." So with limited vision men look at history. Here are rivers of blood; there are broken scepters; yonder are falling empires. No virtue seems ascendant; again vice rolls like a billow. Shrieks of pain alternate with shouts of joy; and man cries: "To what purpose?" Rise, disheartened soul! From the summit of ages look again! See! Behold this, and history is intelligible. Every fact fits into its place. Drops of blood, and tears of sorrow, and carols of joy, are but symbols by which the record may be read. Its pages tell the growth of an ordered plan, and throughout its course runs a central current which loses itself in God.

THE JUDGMENTS OF HISTORY.

By JOHN HOVEY KIMBALL, of Beloit College.

BIOGRAPHICAL.

The contest in 1893 was awarded to Mr. John Hovey Kimball, of Beloit College, who spoke on "The Judgments of History." Mr. Kimball, speaking after the nine others on the program, won the close attention of a tired audience, and gained the popular verdict. He has the unique honor of having won six firsts in the Wisconsin State Oratorical Contest, being the only speaker who has ever won this distinction.

Mr. Kimball was born at Nashua, N. H., January 21, 1871. His father was a banker. His ancestry shows no special bent toward public speech. After graduating from Beloit, in 1893, he studied theology at the Yale Divinity School, receiving his degree in 1896. He was ordained to the ministry at Stoughton, Wisconsin, March 16, 1898. After a three-years pastorate there, he removed to California, where he has been pastor one year at Sebastopol and four years at San Mateo. The earthquake which brought such ruin in San Francisco, also seriously injured his little church and parsonage in San Mateo. Mr. Kimball and his congregation are now putting their shoulder to the task of reconstruction, having a share in the remarkable spirit of progress which characterizes the afflicted district. Mr. Kimball is today the same clear-cut type of man that he was in college, hardworking, earnest, unassuming, but capable of a strong fight for a worthy cause.

THE ORATION.

Delivered at the Inter-State Oratorical Contest at Columbus, Ohio, May 4, 1893, taking first prize. Judges: Dr. C. W. BELSER, Dr. T. C. CHAMBERLAIN, Pres. C. F. THWING, Rev. Dr. J. A. ROUTHALER, Pres. S. F. NEFF, and Judge D. F. PUGH.

In the Pantheon at Paris is a strange symbol. The tomb of Rousseau is hewn as if the dead man